Process of reducing clay



UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

JAMES o. ANDERSON, or HIGHLAND PARK, IIILINOIS.

PROCESS, OF REDUCING CLAY, CLAY-SHALE, 80C.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 248,080, dated October 11, 1881'.

Application filed J nly 23, 1881. (No model.)

To all whom it may concern Be it known that I, JAMES C. ANDERSON, a citizen of the United States, and a resident of Highland Park, in the county of Lake and State of Illinois, have invented a new and useful Process of Reducing Clay, Clay- Shale, Feldspathic, Granitic, and other analogous substances to a powdered or pulverized condition, of which the following is a specification.

The object of my invention is to reduce to a powdered or pulverized condition clay, clayshale, feldspathic and granitic rocks, or other analogous materials while in a dry, or practically-dry, condition; and my invention consists in passing the clay, clay-shale,feldspathic and granitic rocks, or other analogous materials through a mechanism by its own gravity, and subjecting said material while in its passage through said mechanism to the action of armed cylinders rotated at'a high speed, which creates opposing currents in the said material ofgreat velocity, and which causes the different currents to collide and more thoroughly disintegrate the particles.

The mechanism which I prefer to use forms the subject-matter of a separate application filed by me June 16, 1881, serial No. 35,839, but other mechanism producing the same results, in substantially the same manner, will be considered within the scope of my invention.

It is desirable in the reduction of clays, clayshales, 860., for the manufacture of brick, tiles, tire-brick, 850., which are pressed into form in a practically-dry state, or in the condition in which the clays, &c., are found in the mines or banks, that the particles be reduced to the smallest possible size and that a uniformity of particles be produced, and at the same time the difi'erent qualities of clay, clay-shale, 8zc., be thoroughly and homogeneously intermingled or mixed. It is desirable, also,in the reduction of feldspathic or granitic rocks in a dry state for uses in the various arts to which they may be applied, that the particles be of a uniform size or of a size specially adapted for the uses to which it is to be employed, as in the pulverized stone used in bituminous compounds for concrete pavements, &c. It is also desirable in thereductionof quartz and metal-bearin grocks, especially where the dry processes are used in chine, as described in the application above referred to, and has a natural tendency downward toward the bottom ofthe machine, caused by the force of gravity. is, however, partially overcome and the pas- The force of gravity sage of the material through the machine retarded by the rapid rotation of the armed cylinders, which imparts to the material a violent rotary motion. The two armed cylinders revolving in lhe'sanie direction divide the material as it enters the machine into two parts and carry the same in two currents through the machine. These currents, owing to the contracted form of the external shell in the center of the machine, are caused to come into violent contact or collision with each other,

caused by the centrifugal force of the armed cylinders. A counter or centripetal action is also caused by the circular-formed shell, and also by the collision of the currents, and thus the materials are to a certain degree held in space while being acted upon, the cohesion of the particles of the material is destroyed and a fine powder or complete disintegration of all the particles is the result.

Having thus described my invention, what I claim, and desire, to secure by Letters Patent, Is

The process herein described of reducing clay, clay-shale, and granitic or other rock or quartz to a powder, the same consisting in causing the said material to pass through a mechanism by the action of gravity, and submittin g said material to the violent action of rapid-rotating armed cy1inde1's, and disintegratin g-currents, as set forth.

. J. G. ANDERSON.

Attest LILLIE E. ANDERSON, S. It. BINGHAM. 

